Objective: Many previous reports have demonstrated significant neural anatomy changes in the brain of high myopic (HM) patients, whereas the spontaneous brain activity changes in the HM patients at rest are not well studied. Our objective was to use amplitude of low-frequency fluctuation (ALFF) method to investigate the changes in spontaneous brain activity in HM patients and their relationships with clinical features. Methods: A total of 38 patients with HM (17 males and 21 females) and 38 healthy controls (HCs) (17 males and 21 females) closely matched in age, sex, and education underwent resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging scans. The ALFF method was used to assess local features of spontaneous brain activity. The relationship between the mean ALFF signal values in many brain regions and the clinical features in HM patients was calculated by correlation analysis. Results: Compared with HCs, the HM patients had significantly lower ALFF in the right inferior and middle temporal gyrus, left middle temporal gyrus, left inferior frontal gyrus/putamen, right inferior frontal gyrus/putamen/insula, right middle frontal gyrus, and right inferior parietal lobule and higher ALFF values in the bilateral midcingulate cortex, left postcentral gyrus, and left precuneus/inferior parietal lobule. However, no relationship was found between the mean ALFF signal values of the different areas and the clinical manifestations in HM. Conclusion: The HM patients were affected with brain dysfunction in many regions, which may indicate the presence of neurobiological changes involving deficits in language understanding and attentional control in HM patients.

High myopia (HM) was associated with impaired long-distance vision. Previous neuroimaging studies showed that abnormal visual experience leads to dysfunction in brain activity in HM even corrected. However, whether alterations in brain structure occur in HM remains unknown. In this study, we analyzed the difference in the whole-brain gray matter volume (GMV) and white matter volume between HM patients and healthy controls (HCs) using a voxel-based morphology method. A total of 82 HM patients (52 men and 30 women) and 58 HCs (28 men and 30 women), matched closely in terms of age and education, were enrolled in this study. All participants underwent MRI scans. The MRI data were processed using the SPM8 software. The relationship between the mean GMV values of the brain regions and clinical features, including refractive diopter and the mean retinal nerve fiber layer thickness, in the HM group were analyzed using Pearson’s correlation. Compared with HCs, HM patients showed significantly decreased GMV values in the right cuneus/lingual gyrus and the right thalamus. In contrast, HM groups showed higher GMV values in the brain stem, right parahippocampal gyrus/thalamus, left parahippocampal gyrus/thalamus, as well as the right and the left putamen. No significantly different white matter volume values were found between the two groups. Moreover, in the HM group, the mean retinal nerve fiber layer of the left eye showed a negative correlation with the mean GMV values of the brain stem (r=−0.218; P=0.049), right parahippocampal gyrus/thalamus (r=−0.262; P=0.017), left parahippocampal gyrus/thalamus (r=−0.249; P=0.024), and left putamen (r=−0.232; P=0.036). We found that HM patients showed an altered brain structure in the visual pathway regions and the limbic system, which may provide useful information to explore the neural mechanisms of impaired long-distance vision in HM.

High myopia (HM) is associated with impaired long-distance vision. accumulating evidences reported that abnormal visual experience leads to dysfunction in brain activity in HM even corrected. However, whether the long-term of abnormal visual experience lead to neuroanatomical changes remain unknown, the aim at this study is to investigate the alternation of cortical surface thickness in HM patients. 82 patients with HM (HM groups), 57 healthy controls (HC groups) were recruited. All participants underwent high-resolution T1 and resting-state functional magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scans. The cortical thickness analysis was preformed to investigate the neuroanatomical changes in HM patients using computational anatomy toolbox (CAT 12) toolbox. Compare with HCs, HM patients showed decreased the cortical surface thickness in the left middle occipital gyrus (MOG), left inferior parietal lobule (IPL), right inferior temporal gyrus (ITG), right precuneus, right primary visual area 1 (V1), right superior temporal gyrus (STG), right superior parietal lobule (SPL), right occipital pole, and right the primary motor cortex (M1), and increased to the parietal operculum (OP4) (P < 0.01, FWE-corrected), the mean cortical thickness of right orbitofrontal cortex (OFC), right dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC) and right subcallosal cortex showed negatively correlation between clinical variables (axis length (ALM), the average macular thickness (AMT), keratometer (KER) 1, KER2, the mean KER, the mean macular fovea thickness (MFK), the refractive diopter) in HM patients. Our result mainly provided an evidence of cortical thickness reduction and disconnection in visual center and visual processing area, and cortical thickness increase in left multimodal integration region in HM patients. This may provide important significance of the study of the neural mechanism of HM.

To investigate the prognostic value of the neutrophil-to-lymphocyte ratio (NLR) in patients with diabetic macular edema (DME) treated monthly with ranibizumab. We retrospectively analyzed the medical records of all patients who received intravitreal ranibizumab (IVR) treatment for DME at the First Affiliated Hospital of Nanchang University between December 2015 and December 2017. Clinicopathological parameters, including NLR, were evaluated to identify predictors of better outcomes of IVR monotherapy. Ninety-one treatment-naïve eyes treated with IVR for DME were retrospectively analyzed in this study. Baseline best-corrected visual acuity (BCVA), neutrophils, NLR, monocyte-to-lymphocyte ratio, and platelet-to-lymphocyte ratio were negatively correlated with the changes in BCVA at 24 weeks compared with the baseline, while baseline central retinal thickness and lymphocytes were positively correlated with the changes in BCVA at 24 weeks compared with the baseline. Multiple linear regression analysis revealed that NLR was independently associated with the mean change of BCVA between baseline and week 24. In addition, patients with NLR < 2.27 showed a better improvement in letter score than those with NLR > 2.27. Pretreatment NLR is independently associated with the BCVA in DME patients treated with IVR, and higher pretreatment NLR may contribute to inferior BCVA outcomes.

To evaluate the associations between development of retinopathy of prematurity (ROP) and serum lymphocyte-to-monocyte ratio (LMR), neutrophil-to-lymphocyte ratio (NLR), and platelet-to-lymphocyte ratio (PLR). A retrospective cohort study was performed, involving infants who were screened for ROP from January 2015 to December 2015. Preterm newborns of ≤32 gestational weeks with ROP were enrolled as the observation group, and non-ROP infants were enrolled as the control group, whose complete blood cell were measured within the first 24h of life. The levels of NLR, LMR and PLR were determined in all groups. The data obtained were analyzed using univariate and multivariate logistic regression analysis. In this study, 40 cases of ROP were enrolled and 40 cases of non-ROP as controls. The LMR levels were significantly higher (P<0.001) in ROP group (3.96±1.16) compared to non-ROP group (2.85±0.79). The NLR levels were significantly lower (P=0.035) in ROP group {median [interquartile range (IQR)], 0.88 (0.67-1.46)} compared to non-ROP group [median (IQR), 1.20 (0.85-1.89)]. The median PLR values were 61.99 (IQR, 50.23-75.98) in ROP group and 69.24 (IQR, 55.52-88.12) in non-ROP group (P=0.104). Logistic regression analysis suggested that LMR was an independent risk factor for ROP (OR: 0.275; 95% CI: 0.134-0.564; P=0.001). The findings demonstrate that higher LMR is independently and significantly associated with the development of ROP, and the LMR may be invoked as a predictive tool for identifying risk for ROP.